“O Holy Night Tops” The Christmas Music Charts

UTICA, N.Y.—Americans prefer signs that it’s Christmas starting the day after Thanksgiving, with 59% of adults saying they like to see Christmas lights on homes, store displays, and hear Christmas tunes on the radio the day after Thanksgiving and no sooner (and also no later!), according to a new Zogby poll.

Speaking of Christmas tunes, out of a list of nine choices, Zogby asked Americans to vote for their three favorite holiday songs. O Holy Night was the clear winner with 58% of adults voting for it as their 1st, 2nd, or 3rd favorite holiday song.

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“White Christmas” (41%), and “The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire)” (38%) also topped the list. “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer” (10%) and Adam Sandler’s the “Hanukkah Song” (9%) received the fewest votes.

More women (62%) than men (53%) prefer “O Holy Night” and considering the strong religious theme, so do adults who attend religious services at least once a week. Only 25% of people who say they never attend religious services picked “O Holy Night” as one of their three favorite holiday songs.

“White Christmas” leads among those who never attend religious services but only 36% of this group voted for “White Christmas” as a top three; 16% said either none of the listed songs were their favorite or that they do not listen to or enjoy holiday songs.

Zogby International conducted an online survey of 2,330 adults from Nov. 4 – 6, 2009. A sampling of Zogby International’s online panel, which is representative of the adult population of the US, was invited to participate. Slight weights were added region, party, age, race, religion, gender, education to more accurately reflect the population. The margin of error is +/- 2.1 percentage points. Margins of error are higher in sub-groups.